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Coastal Point • Susan Walls: An IR runner hits the gap to gain some yards in 39-21 loss to Polytech on Friday, Sept. 15.A week after their 21-20 surprise season opener victory over Caravel Academy in the Blue/Gold Kickoff Classic, Indian River’s varsity football found themselves 39-21 prey to the Polytech Panthers last Friday at home. The Panthers’ special teams scooped up the opening kick off and returned it to the Indians end zone. A swift extra point kick gave the Panthers an early 7-0 lead.

IR’s punt return team quickly answered with their own punt return and kick, tying it seven all with 7:59 minutes remaining in the first quarter. The Panthers’ punt-return team got them to mid-field for the start of a tie-breaking drive that ended with senior wide receiver Douglas Reed grabbing a pass near the end zone that he carried across the goal line. The extra point kick split the goal posts giving the Panthers a 14-7 lead.

The Panther offense got another six points, but missed the point-after kick. With 6:50 remaining in the first half, IR scored on another punt return and point after, making it 20-14 Panthers — where it stayed until the first half expired.

Coastal Point • File Photo : Bethany Beach FIrst Responders Tri-Du-Aquabike partcipants learn to enter and exit the ocean during training for the event back in 2013.Athletes of all age and skill level will descend upon Bethany Beach this weekend for the 6th annual Bethany Beach First Responders Tri-Du-Aquabike.

The event was created to support the first responders of the Bethany Beach Volunteer Fire Department.

“All the proceeds go to the Bethany Beach first responders at Station 70,” said Race Director Rick Hundley, noting the event has raised close to $100,000 since its inception.

While the event itself will take place on Sunday, Sept. 24, with transition area opening at 5:30 a.m., activities will begin this Friday with a welcoming party at The Starboard in Dewey Beach.

There have been some — not many — folks who took pickleball lessons but later slowed down their participation. When I spoke with them, I mostly heard expected answers: a new grandchild, a pulled muscle, etc. But several told me that they didn’t feel they were getting any better, or were not athletic enough.

Two-lane highways are under volume pressure as more houses and vehicles bring people to coastal Delaware. There will be a public meeting to discuss traffic conditions along Route 54 (Lighthouse Road) on Tuesday, Sept. 19, at 12:30 p.m. at the Roxana Volunteer Fire Company’s fire hall.

Price tag could be more than $200 per year per property in town

If Frankford and Dagsboro unify their police departments, Frankford residents could pay more than $200 per year in additional town taxes, beyond what they currently pay, according to figures presented at an informational meeting in the Frankford fire hall on Tuesday, Sept. 12.

Coastal Point • File Photo : The now-annual Cops & Goblins event in Ocean View is a great opportunity for kids to celebrate Halloween in a safe atmosphere, and allows the community to get to know the Ocean View police a little more.Three years ago, the Ocean View Police Department took a seed of an idea and created the community-oriented Halloween event known as Cops & Goblins.

“Chief came to me one day a few years ago and said, ‘Rhys, I have an idea,’” recalled Sgt. Rhys Bradshaw. “‘I’ve been thinking about creating a Halloween event — something free for the kids in the community.’

“Where I grew up in New Jersey, Halloween was an event. We went out and trick-or-treated all through the neighborhoods. You don’t see that much around here,” Bradshaw said.

The free event hosts families in Ocean View’s John West Park for a few hours, offering families a safe environment for trick-or-treating while having positive interactions with local law-enforcement officers.

Delaware Botanic Gardens volunteers sow 17,000 plants

Coastal Point • Susan Lyons: Piet Oudolf, designer of the meadowlands of the Delaware Botanic Gardens at Pepper Creek, signs copies of his book during a work day at the Gardens last week.How does a soybean field become a world-class garden? One plant at a time.

Although work has continued quietly at Delaware Botanic Gardens at Pepper Creek for a few years, this week was especially noteworthy, as volunteers planted the first part of the gardens’ meadowlands, designed by world-renowned designer Piet Oudolf.

“It was a huge operation. We have had about 50 volunteers. They came from everywhere … from Boston to Tennessee,” said Executive Director Sheryl Swed. “When Piet comes, he takes a look to see if it’s perfect, or he does tweaking.”

Just outside Dagsboro, some onlookers thrilled to see the Dutch designer pick up a rake to help shape the grass mounds. Others begged an autograph or two.

“My idea was to make a perennial meadow with the use of many natives, but in my own way. I have a very impressionistic style,” Oudolf said while examining the grounds.

The 1.5-acre meadow is a controlled mass of plants, shaped rather like a figure 8 or an ampersand. The thick pathways curve through the meadow, the plants clearly delineated from the walkway.

“The whole layout is so that people can meander and walk through the garden,” Oudolf said. “Every turn is a different perspective. … You want people to feel like they discovered something.”

The Town of Frankford has been relying on Delaware State Police coverage since the resignation of former police chief Mark Hudson in July. Even before Hudson’s departure, there were some concerns that there simply wasn’t enough police coverage in the town, particularly with the area-wide rise in heroin-related crimes.

Reader proud of Operation SEAs the Day

Editor:

We were minding our own business, driving east on 54 last Friday, when first we noticed all the pedestrians waving flags, and then we saw strobing police lights and heard the horns. All the cars stopped as the parade came towards us. We soon realized it had to do with SEAs the Day.

Coastal Point • Submitted : Some of the Thank A Police Offer Day on Delmarva crew spent time offering their appreciation to officers of the Dagsboro Police Department last year.While many may only encounter police officers when they’ve been speeding or have a taillight out, one organization is asking the public to recognize the dangers of policing and take the time this weekend to thank their local law-enforcement officers.

“From my standpoint, you go to work, I go to work — neither one of us is doing jobs where we may get shot at, where we may get yelled at, where we may get disrespected at,” said Andrea Baumann, a Sussex County resident overseeing Thank A Police Officer Day on Delmarva.

“They work a lot of hours, they see a lot of things, and then … they still have to, at the end of the day, after handling some horrific things that most of us would have nightmares about, be a normal person — husband, wife, father or mother — to their own families… I feel even just making a small gesture is acknowledging what they do, and maybe silently saying, ‘Thank you. We appreciate what you do out there,’ can make a difference.”

This Saturday, Sept. 16, is National Thank A Police Officer Day, created in 2012 by the Whole Truth Project, an organization “dedicated to protecting innocent police officers, wrongfully accused of police misconduct in wrongful conviction lawsuits and other civil rights cases.”

The community theater group has found a new home at Woodsong Country Inn & Retreat, near Frankford.

Having traditionally performed at Dickens Parlour Theatre in Millville, BART is bidding the tiny theater a fond farewell to find a larger stage. The Woodsong bed-and-breakfast had room to spare and allows BART to have a summer season.

Performances of “The Mousetrap” will be held on Sept. 21, 22, 23, 29 and 30 at 7:30 p.m., with a matinee on Sept. 24 at 2 p.m.

Coastal Point • Submitted: The Holt Dukes Wadley House, built around 1884, will be featured on the Ocean View Historical Society’s inaugural tour of historic homes on Oct. 7.Above the wicker table in the living room of the c. 1884 Holt Dukes Wadley House is a picture of its early owners, Henry and Jenny (Eunice Jane Short) Holt. Jenny was an avid churchgoer, so Henry bought and moved the old Ocean View Presbyterian Church to their back yard to make room for the current Presbyterian Church sanctuary.

The church joined several outbuildings on the property, including a chicken coop, outhouse, summer kitchen and old barn. Many of the structures were donated to the Lewes Historical Society prior to the Ocean View Historical Society’s formation, but the Holt Dukes Wadley House will be among the historic homes in the area featured on the Ocean View Historical Society’s inaugural Coastal Towns Historic Homes Tour on Saturday, Oct. 7.

Tour goers can walk through the colonial-style home, which tradition has it was the first house in Ocean View to acquire indoor plumbing. Large front and side porches provide spots for current owners George and Nancy Dukes Wadley to “soak in” the Sussex sunshine. The owners described the home’s interior as “early attic,” with no TVs anywhere, so the inside ambience is somewhat true to its post-Civil War origins.

Special to the Coastal Point • Bruce Walls: Siera Johnson blocks a shot.A young Indian River High School girls’ volleyball team opened their 2017 season by surprising an older, more experienced Caesar Rodney team, 3-2, on Tuesday, Sept. 12, on their home court in Dagsboro.

IR took the first set 25-19. CR, who had beaten Concord High School the prior Friday night, responded with a 25-21 win in the second set. IR fought back, winning the third set 25-19. CR held on, winning the fourth set 25-18, but IR sealed the win in the final set, 15-13.

Leading the Indians’ charge was freshman Raychel Ehlers, who was 14-4-0-4-0 for the night.

“I’m proud of the way we played tonight,” Ehlers said. “It was our first game of the season, and we came out strong. I knew I did good and hit the ball hard, but it was a team effort.”

Special to the Coastal Point • Vaughn Baker: The Ocean View Crew’s Steve Melofchik gets ready to hit a serve from behind the baseline.This year is the 50th anniversary of the first pickleball court, and the 2017 tournament in Ocean City, Md., celebrated that event. Here are some lines from the poem to honor that event:

It was the year 1967, we all were feeling GroovE…

The hippies created their very own lingo,

The words of which never appeared in bingo,

Hippies had their own symbol, the famous Peace sign,

Which they stole from England, too stoned to self design,

Spent much of their time in flip-flops at 9th Street in the sand,

Listening to great music like Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band

Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds, Hello GoodBye, Penny Lane,

Strawberry Fields Forever, All You Need Is Love, all hits main…

The first permanent pickleball court was built, the game itself two years before,

Only the Lord above knows where and why they came up with the pickle score

When opening their property tax bills this summer, many local residents expected their taxes to increase because of the March public-school referendum. But the Indian River School District’s successful referendum isn’t the only reason that taxes increased.

With the new school year having begun on Tuesday, Sept. 5, the Indian River School District is putting the finishing touches on its administration lineup. Although most of the transition was completed before July, a few new opportunities recently opened up for IR staff. Last-minute changes were made at several schools:

Coastal Point • Laura Walter: Ana Calles’ crown holds dozens of glittering rhinestones that represent the beauty, poise, intelligence and quick thinking she displayed at the 2017 Miss Hispanic Delaware pageant.Selbyville is home to a new pageant winner and community leader: 17-year-old Ana Calles was crowned Miss Hispanic Delaware this week.

“It’s still very surreal to me, because it’s just something that I’ve been wanting for a long time, and that it’s actually manifested into reality — it’s very surreal,” Calles said.

She has just begun 11th grade at Indian River High School. As the pageant’s only downstate contestant, Calles said she was happy to stand out geographically, despite the necessity of the two-hour drive to the Baby Grand theater in Wilmington’s Grand Opera House for rehearsals and the competition.

Calles represented Mexico in the Aug. 26 program, which celebrates Hispanic culture and is designed to help young ladies develop poise and communication skills. Calles has lived in Selbyville all her life, except for a few years in Mexico when she was younger.

“I was nervous throughout the whole day, but after our opening-number dance, I felt more confident and comfortable on stage,” she said of her very first pageant.

Calles had dreamed of competing for years, but her family had just suffered the painful impact of losing her mother in April.

“I just wanted to make her proud her proud, overall, even though I know just competing made her proud,” Calles said. “I know she was with me that night. I could feel her.”

Coastal Point • Tyler Valliant: Reine Jesel recently celebrated his 100th birthday, surrounded by friends and family at this favorite morning coffee joint, the Selbyville McDonald’s.On almost any morning in the Selbyville McDonald’s, a group of older men can be found laughing together over breakfast.

In the far corner this week, one white-haired fellow with bright eyes and a big grin enjoyed a special spotlight. After all, Reine Jesel had just celebrated his 100th birthday.

He still drives himself to McDonald’s six days a week for a black coffee to read the daily paper (no eyeglasses required). He won’t need to renew his driver license until he’s 105.

“I’m fortunate,” he said.

Most of his life was spent in New Jersey, working as a general contractor in the construction business. He was 85 when he and his wife, Shirley, moved to the outskirts of Frankford about 15 years ago.

What has been affectionately coined as “Locals’ Summer,” kicked off Monday afternoon, and people from around the community crawled out of their coccoons, hit the beach and visited local shops and restaurants again after the unofficial end of summer that is marked by Labor Day weekend.

Anheuser-Busch, a titan amongst titans in the beer industry, announced last week that it was stopping the distribution of beer at its Georgia brewery to produce water for those suffering in floods in Texas.

Coastal Point • Laura Walter : The Hansen family donated a panoramic photo of their favorite vacation spot — the Delaware beaches — to the Town of Fenwick Island. Allen Hansen, right, was joined by his daughter, Alicia Hatcher, and granddaughter to present the donation.Love for the beach recently inspired longtime visitors to donate a framed panoramic beach photo to the Town of Fenwick Island.

“Fenwick Island will always remain as one of our most pleasurable places to get to know,” said Allen Hansen, who has seen the Taj Mahal and flown over Venezuelan jungles and Mount Everest. “We pay back in a small way the happiness [this place] has brought for so many years.”

Hansen and his wife, Charmaine, had commissioned Pam and Tony Goodman of Atlantic Portrait Studios to create the image, which is a composite of 12 different photographs edited together. The photos were captured from atop a Fenwick Island sand dune near the Hansens’ vacation house. The final panoramic view shows the curvature of the Earth — a delight for someone who has traveled across the globe.

Coastal Point • Submitted: The Smith house, built around 1839, has been renovated to expand the space. The home will be featured on the Ocean View Historical Society’s inaugural tour of historic homes on Oct. 7.Perhaps the oldest surviving house in Ocean View, the circa-1839 Smith House was built by the Tunnell family on the Indian River and then moved to its present Daisy Avenue location a century later, before 1937. It will be among the historic homes in the area featured on the Ocean View Historical Society’s inaugural Coastal Towns Historic Homes Tour on Saturday, Oct. 7.

Duncan and Cindy Smith purchased the original 1,800-square-foot colonial-style home in 1999 and then renovated it into a 4,000-square-foot home for their young family. They used antiques to capture the house’s history: hanging doors from an old general store on the master bedroom shower, installing seats from the Lord Baltimore School auditorium and making indoor swings from the floor joist of the pre-Civil War house. The home still has its first fireplace, and the house’s original exterior front doors are now hung at the entry to the master bedroom.

Tourgoers can search for more creative adaptations in the game room and other areas. The grounds include a white picket fence, entrance arbor and in-ground pool.